December 10, 2012

year published |

2012

Here is a story that has not previously been adequately told: the story of the developments, trends, and visionary people that are, in many ways, mitigating the climate crisis and turning sustainable development into reality, not just a grand concept. In A Newer World, the environmentalist Bill Hewitt explores the advances in business and finance, politics, design, science, and engineering that are transforming the world around us right now,… read more

October 21, 2010

year published |

2010

Amazon | During the last 50 years, coincident with the Space Age, cosmic evolution has been recognized as the master narrative of the universe, history writ large. Cosmic evolution includes physical, biological, and cultural evolution, and of these the latter is by far the most rapid.

In this volume, authors with diverse backgrounds in science, history, anthropology, and more, consider culture in the context of the cosmos. How… read more

October 4, 2011

Amazon | A search for the contemporary Nikola Tesla — considered a mad scientist by his society for predicting global warming more than 100 years ago — fuels this analysis of climate issues, which introduces thinkers and inventors who are working to find possible ways out of the energy crisis.

From Louis Michaud, a retired refinery engineer who claims we can harness the energy of man-made tornadoes, to… read more

April 9, 2009

In his first book since the bestselling Fermat’s Enigma, Simon Singh offers the first sweeping history of encryption, tracing its evolution and revealing the dramatic effects codes have had on wars, nations, and individual lives. From Mary, Queen of Scots, trapped by her own code, to the Navajo Code Talkers who helped the Allies win World War II, to the incredible (and incredibly simple) logisitical breakthrough that made Internet… read more

May 31, 2015

year published |

2015

Book summary from the publisher:

While modern medicine produces miracles, it also delivers care that is too often unsafe, unreliable, unsatisfying, and impossibly expensive. For the past few decades, technology has been touted as the cure for all of healthcare’s ills.

But medicine stubbornly resisted computerization, until now. Over the past five years, thanks largely to billions of dollars in federal incentives, healthcare has finally gone digital.… read more

February 23, 2011

author |

Elias Aboujaoude

year published |

2011

Amazon | A penetrating examination of the insidious effects of the Internet on our personalities — online and off. Whether sharing photos or following financial markets, many of us spend a shocking amount of time online. While the Internet can enhance well-being, Elias Aboujaoude has spent years treating patients whose lives have been profoundly disturbed by it.

March 23, 2012

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Daron Acemoglu, James Robinson

year published |

2012

Amazon | Brilliant and engagingly written, Why Nations Fail answers the question that has stumped the experts for centuries: Why are some nations rich and others poor, divided by wealth and poverty, health and sickness, food and famine?

Is it culture, the weather, geography? Perhaps ignorance of what the right policies are?

Simply, no. None of these factors is either definitive or destiny. Otherwise, how… read more

November 29, 2010

author |

Nicholas Agar

year published |

2010

Amazon | Proposals to make us smarter than the greatest geniuses or to add thousands of years to our life spans seem fit only for the spam folder or trash can. And yet this is what contemporary advocates of radical enhancement offer in all seriousness. They present a variety of technologies and therapies that will expand our capacities far beyond what is currently possible for human beings.… read more

December 27, 2013

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Erez Aiden, Jean-Baptiste Michel

year published |

2013

“One of the most exciting developments from the world of ideas in decades, presented with panache by two frighteningly brilliant, endearingly unpretentious, and endlessly creative young scientists.” — Steven Pinker, author of The Better Angels of Our Nature

Our society has gone from writing snippets of information by hand to generating a vast flood of 1s and 0s that record almost every aspect of our lives: who we know,… read more

November 10, 2014

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Jim Al-Khalili, Johnjoe McFadden

year published |

2014

Life is the most extraordinary phenomenon in the known universe; but how does it work? Even in this age of cloning and synthetic biology, the remarkable truth remains: nobody has ever made anything living entirely out of dead material. Life remains the only way to make life. Are we missing a vital ingredient in its creation?

Like Richard Dawkins’ The Selfish Gene, which provided a new perspective on… read more

February 2, 2015

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David Z Albert

year published |

2015

After Physics presents ambitious new essays about some of the deepest questions at the foundations of physics, by the physicist and philosopher David Albert. The book’s title alludes to the close connections between physics and metaphysics, much in evidence throughout these essays. It also alludes to the work of imagining what it would be like for the project of physical science—considered as an investigation into the fundamental laws of… read more

December 14, 2013

Inspired by the real-life breakthroughs covered in the pages of MIT Technology Review, renowned writers Brian W. Aldiss, David Brin, and Greg Egan join the hottest emerging authors from around the world to envision the future of the Internet, biotechnology, computing, and more.

March 28, 2013

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Buzz Aldrin, Leonard David

year published |

2013

In a new book from National Geographic, celebrated astronaut and bestselling author Buzz Aldrin boldly advocates continuing exploration of our solar system. In Mission to Mars: My Vision for Space Exploration by Buzz Aldrin and Leonard David, Aldrin lays out his goals for the space program and how he believes we can get humans to Mars by the 2030s, a vision shared by President Obama and one that is fortified by private… read more

May 5, 2011

Amazon | “The entire conversation took five minutes. When it was over, Bill and I looked at each other. It was one thing to talk about writing a language for a microprocessor and another to get the job done . . . If we’d been older or known better, Bill and I might have been put off by the task in front of us. But we were… read more

April 18, 2013

author |

Mark Alpert

year published |

2013

A malevolent, artificial life form created by military scientists threatens to destroy humanity in this smart, Crichtonesque thriller.

Jim Pierce hasn’t heard from his daughter in years, ever since she rejected his military past and started working as a hacker. But when a Chinese assassin shows up at Jim’s lab looking for her, he knows that she’s cracked some serious military secrets. Now, her life is on the line if he doesn’t find her first.